Here is me playing the piano, specifically a bit of improvisation around the Doctor Who theme:

... Aaand that's why automatic keyword retweet bots are a silly idea

So I have a Dreamwidth thing it is here:

http://peeeeeeet.dreamwidth.org

I will probably be winding up the LJ (COS I HAVE POSTED SO MUCH LATELY) and posting over there. If you have a dreamwidth account you have to tell me, it's like cops and sex workers in movies, only a simile. IT'S A SIMILE. (Though if I thought people would tip me I would be all over Chaturbate)

Doctor Who comes back soon. It has a Prince-t-shirt-wearing lesbian-with-an-Afro companion, and yet ODDLY I am not that excited. Mainly because after this season Chinballs takes over and will cast a boring Doctor and write rubbish episodes.

Roootin' around the hard drive looking for abandoned WIPs I found that I had attempted to do a modern update of the Two Ronnies' "Answering the question before last" sketch. I didn't complete it because you might be surprised to hear that it was incredibly difficult. Anyway I thought you might exhale a small amount of air through your nose if I posted here as far as I got. My only real endeavour was to finish with an obscene joke about Margaret Thatcher, I think you will agree that I avoided abject failure on that score at least.

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Something that bugs me about Arrival ( spoilers, OBV, for ArrivalCollapse )

OK so I may have become a little obsessed with the Black Mirror episode "San Junipero", released on Netflix last week. (If you haven't seen it yet, DO NOT READ THIS. INSTEAD, CONSIDER WATCHING THE EPISODE. WITH YOUR EYES AND NETFLIX AND VISUAL CORTEX. There are going to be spoilers.) I'm not the only one; plenty of people on social meeeeeja loved it, were moved to tears and consider it one of the best bits of telly for aaaages. Some of these people are quite unlikely too, such as the Scottish comedian "Daft Limmy", who said "That San Junipero episode of Black Mirror is one of the top 10 things I've ever watched in my whole life." Not only its fans are unlikely, either. Nothing Charlie Brooker has written before anticipated it, not even "Be Right Back", the previous award holder of "not the most depressingly bleak episode of Black Mirror". Some people have pointed out that it comes at a perfect time, during a year in which the killing off of queer women characters in telly shows reached saturation point. Check out Autostaddle's definitive guide if you haven't already:

http://www.autostraddle.com/all-65-dead-lesbian-and-bisexual-characters-on-tv-and-how-they-died-312315/

You might say "San Junipero" isn't a conscious reaction to this, given that it was in development before this blew up. But the "Bury Your Gays" trope (I won't link to TV Tropes, thank me later) has been building for a long ass time and Brooker is easily media-savvy enough to have been aware of it. That he wrote a happy ending for a lesbian/bi couple is great. That they get the happiest ending Black Mirror has available is astonishing. This puts it best:

http://possibilistfanfiction.tumblr.com/post/152231091766/almost-every-show-on-tv-see-those-lesbians-what#152231091766

• almost every show on tv: see those lesbians? what a great representation. we are gonna kill them now, cause isn't this realistic??


• black mirror, a show with literally none happy endings whatsoever: this beautiful interracial wlw couple is gonna live forever.


• almost every show on tv: but-


• black mirror: FOREVER

... made even better if you imagine the last word as sung in the Vicar of Dibley theme:



But it isn't just a heart-warming queer lagoon in the middle of an otherwise disturbing season. It's one of the most densely packed episodes of TV I can remember, with almost every moment doing two or three things at once, many of them not apparent on a first watch or operating subconsciously. So, because I like to smash up things I love, we're going to go through this, Lego brick by Lego brick, looking at the deftness of the writing, cinematography, direction and performances.

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Today, everyone is ranking all Black Mirror episodes, but unfortunately some of these lists appear to have been written by FOOOOOOOLS. Here is a better ranking, it contains a couple of MILD, OH SO VERY VERY MILD SPOILERS.

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So, like all humans that exist, I eventually clicked on the "30 day free trial of Amazon Prime" button while trying to not do that. What the hey, I think, let us see what they have that's better than Netflix. Maybe it's just the novelty of a fresh selection, but I found a few things I want to watch. Behold, then, the latest in an occasional series: Pete Watches Films!

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Western society has spent the day fondly reminiscing about the one person called Muhammad and/or Ali that they rather liked.

John Smith, a stock-broker from Dudley, said "How can I be Islamophobic, if that even is a real collection of sounds with a widely agreed on meaning, or 'word'? I've loved watching Ali fights ever since six years before I was born, when the last one happened."

He went on, "It's true that I've criticised Muslims in the past, but to me Ali was different. Islam is an inciteful, violent creed that leads to much strife, whereas Ali made a living repeatedly punching people in the face until they couldn't stand up any more... he was an athlete, is what I'm saying," he added after an awkward pause.

Boris H Clarkson agreed. "His struggle for equal rights for black and white folk was legendary. Male ones, I mean. Obviously he thought women should still be subservient. No one's going to argue with him about that."

When asked whether Ali's conversion ever made him rethink his attitude towards Muslims, Clarkson answered, "Not really. Half of them can't even spell 'Muhammad' properly."